R.A. Dickey, Lin Dunn honored by Tennessee lawmakers

The General Assembly passed a pair of resolutions Wednesday honoring Tennesseans for surprising athletic achievements relatively late in their careers.

Lawmakers gave a nod to R.A. Dickey, the journeyman pitcher who, at 37 years old, won his first Cy Young Award last fall. In a nice bit of rhetorical flourish, Senate Joint Resolution 99 noted Dickey’s “unrivaled knuckleball” that “mowed down batters by the score as they failed to make solid contact with the baffling pitch only a rare few have perfected.”

Dickey was the first knuckleballer to ever win the Cy Young, leading the National League in strikeouts and shutouts while ranking second in wins and earned run average. At one point in the season, Dickey pitched 44 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings, a streak that included a pair of one-hitters — an extremely rare feat.

Lawmakers also passed Senate Joint Resolution 95 honoring Lin Dunn, coach of the Women’s National Basketball Association’s Indiana Fever. A pioneering women’s basketball coach, the 65-year-old Dunn has amassed more than 600 wins at the collegiate and professional levels, leading the Purdue Boilermakers to the Final Four once and serving on the staff of gold-medal winning international teams, but before last season, she had never won the top title on her own.

“Lin Dunn stands among her peers as one of the finest basketball coaches in America,” the resolution reads, “and her incredible career coaching records at both the collegiate and professional level only serve to cement her prominent position in the pantheon of women’s basketball coaches.”